Along with the development of electronic technologies, more and more electric appliances have various hardware modules integrated therein to perform different physical functions. For example, these hardware modules include an electric heater, a fan, a motor, numerous sensors, etc. In order to control operation of these hardware modules, a traditional master control board of the electric appliance has to be connected respectively to the respective hardware modules to provide them with power supply or signal exchange. Moreover, switches or relays for controlling power supply to the hardware modules are also typically integrated on the master control board.
However, this known direct-connection control mode has increasingly become a bottleneck of a system design as new devices and functions are constantly being introduced. It will have the master control board populated with a larger number of devices and consequently of a larger size and lowered flexibility and at a higher maintenance cost. In view of this, another control mode has been developed to control a master control board with controlled components via a bus in an attempt to take place of the traditional direct-connection control mode. This bus-type control architecture requires each node coupled on the bus to have some data processing power. Nevertheless numerous traditional hardware modules, e.g., a heating pipe, an electrical machine, a valve, etc., have no data processing function as such and consequently have to be connected thereon with an intelligent control module. Unfortunately, it may be rather difficult to devise a versatile intelligent connector installable on different hardware modules due to the diversity of hardware modules as well as their structural and size differences.